Scalability in today's data center is increasingly achieved with horizontal, scale-out solutions, which often include large quantities of simple servers. The usage model of scale-out hardware is, however, drastically different than that of traditional enterprise platforms and, therefore, requires a new approach to platform management.
In order to enable platform management in large server installations such as those described above, managed computer systems commonly include a baseboard management controller (“BMC”). A BMC is a specialized service processor that monitors the physical state of a computer, network server or other hardware device using sensors and communicates with a system administrator through an out-of-band (“OOB”) network connection.
BMCs typically communicate with the computing systems that host them using interfaces and commands defined by the Intelligent Platform Management Interface (“IPMI”). IPMI is a set of computer interface specifications for autonomous computer systems, like BMCs, that provide monitoring capabilities independently of a host system's processor, firmware, and operating system. IPMI commands are capable of transmitting only small amounts of information at a time and, therefore, are typically inappropriate for use in transmitting large amounts of data such as that utilized by modern manageability interfaces. However, IPMI commands and the associated interfaces between BMCs and host firmware must be maintained in order to ensure backward compatibility, even when modern manageability interfaces are utilized.
It is with respect to these and other considerations that the disclosure made herein is presented.